BP expects to discover oil reserves at SWAP to compensate for a decline in oil production at its major project in Azerbaijan – the Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli oilfields, which account for most of the country’s oil output.

The private company will develop the block that includes the Buzovna-Mashtaga, Gala and Zira fields near the capital Baku.

The 200,000-barrel-per-day STAR refinery controlled by SOCAR was launched in 2018. The facility on Turkey’s Aegean coast processed 10.5 million tonnes of oil in 2020.

Analysts said the agreement bode well for rapid progress in clinching a treaty and quelling nationalist sentiment preventing its signature. They also suggested that although the EU sponsored the talks, Russia would maintain play an important role in overseeing a settlement in the region.

Crude is processed at the Baku Oil Refinery, which produces 15 different petroleum products, including gasoline, aviation kerosene, diesel fuel, naphta, petroleum coke, and others.

Fitch expects all these economies to grow in 2022, but has cut its forecasts by 0.2-4 percentage points, with the largest cuts for commodity importers.

The ADB projected the gross domestic product (GDP) growth in Central Asia and South Caucasus at 3.6 percent in 2022 and 4.0 percent next year.

Azerbaijan exports natural gas to Turkey and Europe through the Southern Gas Corridor and continues to make inroads into an energy market which until now has been dominated by Russia.